Ashes: Subject 001
by ThatOneDwarf
Summary: One-shot prequel to the stories A Rise from Ashes and Ashes of the Past. Read both to avoid spoilers.


**[Orange Islands – Tangerine Isle, Team Rocket Academy of Medical Affairs]**

Giovanni Viridian, Boss, and leader of Team Rocket entered the medical institution, being led by a secretary in a lab coat.

The Academy of Medical Affairs was strictly that. Medical Affairs.

Those who were permitted into this Academy were disabled, or handicapped trainees who had been granted into the secondary forces of Team Rocket due to there intelligence, or to put it bluntly, use to Team Rocket.

The building had the workings of a hospital.

The lobby and hallways he was led through smelled strongly of sterilization products, and the white ceramic tiles on the floor were speck free.

Those who were enlisted in the Academy were lucky to see the light of day, some had never even been exposed to the sun during their life time.

This included the person, no experiment, he was there to see.

He was led through the labyrinth of hallways and into a curtained off room less then two meters wide.

The woman in the lab-coat who had escorted him pulled a draw string from the ceiling, and the curtain which hung against the wall were pulled aside.

"Is she ready?" He asked, eyes fastened on the sixteen year old girl who stood naked in the center of the room on the other side, arms raised above her head as doctors and nurses gave her a physical.

The girl was sickly pale, her skin white from the lack of exposure to UV Rays, while her hair, a pale blond, reached well past her bottom. She was healthy he knew, it was top priority to keep her so. The blue eyes which had been augmented from the violet of her original were emotionless, but in there own way were alert.

"Once her check up is completed she will be moved into surgery," the secretary said, "her body is still incredibly unstable despite the therapy she's been given, but if her enhancements are successful, she will likely be ready for active duty,"

His plans were set in motion only months ago, but he still held little to no Intel about Ash Ketchums progress within his organization. The instructors had reported that for the first few months he had been nothing but a child, crying, whining, being obtuse when things didn't go his way.

But there had been a switch-flip.

His to be Elite had begun accelerating in his studies, accelerating and cutting himself off from the rest of the organization.

The boy had set up a wall of defenses against the inside.

Something that was prohibiting him from keeping him on a tight leash.

So the solution to the matter was simple.

Tear down those walls, brick by brick in secrecy to allow an extra set of ears to secure those inner emotions that the boy held in tight security.

This was to be the role the girl in front of him would serve to possess.

She would gain Ash Ketchums trust and report back to him.

-x-x-x-x-

The periodic check-ups which were given to her made her feel sick.

Well what she believed feeling sick would feel like.

She had never been sick a day in her life, confined to a sterile room for 19 hours a day, while the remaining were spent being tested on, getting blood taken, urine samples, hormone levels.

The men, it was always the men, who worked on her made her want to scream, run...

When they kept their hands to long on her, squeezed tighter then they should have, touched her more then they should have.

The woman here were no different, gazing at her as if she were despicable, unfit to be alive.

From the books she had read, books were her one savior in the entire institution, she believed that it was because she was prettier then them.

In all of the dramas, romances, historical novels she had read, and there had been a lot of them -ten years worth in fact-, she had read in multiple occurrences where woman looked down on those who were above them in physical appearance.

Although she couldn't confirm that this was true, yes she may have the body of a 16 year old girl, but was she really attractive?

She didn't know.

She was the only girl her age in the building.

She had lived there since being awoken in that vact, the liquid where she had been created. She had no memories or motorization skills, yet retained basic, very basic speaking abilities from her original.

She understood after explanations that she was not human, but a science experiment that was the first success.

The first weeks out of the vact had blurred together after so long, she remembered tests... Dozens, if not hundreds of tests, and then after who knows long, without explanation she had been brought to this building where she had been ever since.

She was told that she was important to Team Rockets success, and that she would undergo studies that normal children took in the real world.

She had done this, still did in fact, but not once had she seen another person even close to her own age. There were older men and woman confined to beds, or wheel chairs -she was both, when in her room she was in bed, when being moved from room to room, she was in a chair-, they all had their own disabilities or injuries.

Some had lost limbs and were in rehab, others had been given impairments like speech, hearing, and mental through their actions outside of the walls of this institution.

But unlike her, they had seen beyond the walls.

She read up on what the outer world was like, how society beyond Team Rocket worked. Governments, occupations, households and such.

She had never experienced these herself, but she could visualize it cleanly.

The one positive she had been told through her time in the building was that she was a fast, and thorough learner, which held tremendously with her studies.

This was apparently a trait she had inherited from her original.

A little girl named Domino.

She knew little about who she had had her DNA replicated from.

She knew that they looked were quite similar in appearance save a few differences. Her hair and skin was paler then the originals, and her eyes shaded blue instead of violet. Physically they were the same in height and bone structure. But she was physically weaker, and under developed compared to the original.

Apparently the lone imperfection in the cloning process.

She was also lacking a name.

She was Subject 001, 001, or simply put 'the girl'.

She held no name. She held no name because she wasn't human.

But apparently she had her uses, even if they were just appearing after ten years since her creation. She had been born, or created with the body of a 6 year old girl who had been created in only months after taking Dominos DNA.

Her use hadn't been revealed to her yet, but her creator, Giovanni, had come with her first assignment as a member of Team Rocket.

An assignment which would put her outside of the institution's walls.

But first she had to undergo another surgery, which was why at the moment one of the doctors was placing a mask over her mouth and noes.

From the brief medical chatter which she had managed to pick out from their discussions, they were going to strengthen her.

Steroids and other medical jabber for her muscles, while reinforcing her bone structure, whatever that meant.

She didn't flinch as the drip was inserted into the vein in her arm, and when the bright florescent light overhead flashed on she felt her vision going hazy.

She closed her eyes like so many time before and allowed herself to fall into heavy slumber.

Weeks went by, and she had begun recovering from surgery.

She was in pain, and when she had awoken and seen herself for the first time post surgery, she had seen many odd lacerations around her body.

Some were said to heal without scarring, smaller would leave little silvery lines on her arms and legs, while others. The strangest of the bunch on her arms and back looked like burns. Circular marks that were bright red, and slowly over time begun darkening.

She had asked what they had done to her, but the doctors kept silent.

And then one day after examination, the Boss had visited her personally.

She found him large and intimidating.

His eyes black like the text in her books, and build menacing. Towering as he loomed over her from the foot of her bed.

He had not entered her little room alone, he had come with a woman with short purple hair and thin rimmed glasses.

The Boss's voice matched his appearance, "001," her spine chilled, and she felt goosebumps rippled down her arms, "how are you feeling now that you've had time to recover?"

She was not prone to conversations, and knew very little about speaking with a higher up. Around the institute her conversations were at the max asking how to solve a problem before reverting back into silence.

From her books, she understood that it was respectful to call a persons boss, Sir or Madam, or name and then Sir or Madam.

"U-Um, I'm feeling... Very. Good Giovanni Sir," She spoke rarely, and the sound of her voice still sounded so foreign to her.

She'd been alive for 10 years, but was still unused to her own voice.

His eyes looked her up and down, she sat on her bed with her bottom half covered by a thin blanket, and her back resting up supported by pillows, "Very good, I have an assignment for you," He said bluntly glancing to the woman beside him, "it is something only I can entrust to you."

She followed the Bosses gaze to the woman, "001," She said now speaking for him, "during the course of the next week you will under go training before being transferred to a new Academy,"

"A-Academy?" She asked hesitantly.

Was she going to learn about proper field work? Was she repaired better then she believed? Could she do the harder jobs that Team Rocket members partake in?

"You will enter the Academy enrolling as a 2nd year trainee," She said, "the details of which will be explained in full during tomorrows briefing, but for the mean time, you enter the Academy and get to know your target, one, Ash Ketchum,"

She didn't understand.

"S-Sorry? I... Don't understand,"

"Ash Ketchum is a valuable member to our organization," Giovanni interrupted, "but he has put up barriers which prohibit us from continuing his growth. Your mission is simple, find him, and befriend him. Learn about him, what he's hiding from us, what he thinks, plans, does. Any information you recover will be relayed from you to me,"

"U-Um, Sir..." There wasn't much of a way to put it rather then bluntly, "shouldn't... This be a job for... A, more well spoken... Person?"

"You were cloned from my highest ranking Elite," He said simply, "I expect that you will live up to the DNA programmed into you. During the next week you will go under drills on how to function in social occasions, and developments. You were chosen for this assignment not because of your personality, but because you haven't been exposed to a lot of the outside world. The person Ash Ketchum needs is someone he can relate to. Someone who can, and will understand what he goes through."

But how could she do that when her entire life has been spent in medical lock down?

The woman spoke again, "A past has been created for you," She said pushing her glasses up as they slid down the bridge of her nose, "you will memorize it, learn it, and you will act as though you've lived it. The details will also be presented during tomorrows briefing,"

So she was going to live a lie then?

Be an actor just to get to know some high priority target?

She wasn't sure what she was expecting for this assignment. She had been hoping to go out and do field work where she'd travel through day light, and sleep beneath the stars.

A job where she wasn't confined within walls.

She wasn't going to complain however.

Her dream to leave this institution where she felt sick whenever someone looked her way was coming to an end. She would be sent somewhere where... Well she didn't know, a school maybe? She lived in a special medical academy, so the one she would be sent to wouldn't be all that different would it? Just teachers, and students.

No doctors.

No tests.

No check-ups.

"U-Understood... Giovanni, Sir."

The black eyes stared at her unwavering, and she found herself shrinking back into her pillows under his stare, but then he said, "Very good," and turned towards the door.

Before he left however, she found her voice once more and asked quickly, "S-Sir?"

He stopped in the door frame and looked back at her, "Yes?"

"U-Um... If I'm going undercover... Will I have a name?"

He stared at her after she had posed the question, analyzing her, "You will," He said, "from tomorrow onwards, you will be 16 year old, Alyssa Marie Cloud,"

And just like that, 10 years after her creation, she became Alyssa Cloud.

* * *

Merry Christmas Eve everyone.

I just spent the last two weeks in the hospital, and while I was in there minor inspiration struck.

So a short one-shot prior to A Rise from Ashes.

I thank you all for reading, and I wish you all a happy holidays.

Before I sign off, I'm letting you know that I have no schedule as to when updates for any of the other stories will come out. I'm focusing on my health and schoolwork for the next couple of weeks so updates will be few and far inbetween.

That's all from me, so thanks again, and this is ThatOneDwarf Signing Off!


End file.
